Google hit with £44m GDPR fine

Google has been hit with a £44m fine by CNIL, a French data regulator, following revelations that the multi-national tech giant breached EU data protection rules.

The CNIL found that personalised adverts had broken General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) rules and that Google’s “lack of transparency, inadequate information and lack of valid consent regarding ads personalisation”.

They judged that the people targetted were “not sufficiently informed” about how Google went about their advertising campaign.

Google have released a small statement stating that they were “studying the decision” and would comment further in due course.

The initial complaints came from two French privacy rights group noyb and La Quadrature de Net, the day GDPR came into force – 25th May 2018.

In a statement, Google said: “People expect high standards of transparency and control from us. We’re deeply committed to meeting those expectations and the consent requirements of the GDPR.”